


Broken

by ThatScottishShipper



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Bad Ending, Character Death, Domestic Violence, Don’t post to another site, Gen, Groundhog Day, Heavy Angst, Psychological Horror, Spoilers, Survival Horror, Time Loop, blame the flowchart
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-24
Updated: 2019-04-24
Packaged: 2020-01-31 08:30:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 799
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18587554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatScottishShipper/pseuds/ThatScottishShipper
Summary: Thanks to malicious interference, Kara relives her escape from Todd's house again and again, but she is unable to save Alice or herself.*Spoilers and distressing content, warnings in tags*





	Broken

Kara had lost count of all the times she saw the Red Wall, flickering and glitching before her.

She had been so sure she broke it, and secured freedom for her and the lonely girl living under a frightening shadow. The Deviated AX-400 pushed through the walls of code telling her to stay where she was, she shot up the stair, took Alice’s hand, and fled the Williams residence.

She  _ had _ to in order to save Alice from her abusive father.

 

In the blink of an eye, Kara saw that Red Wall again, and the oppressive reminder of the home they both escaped from surrounding her. With no time to dwell on this curiosity, she did everything she had done on that stormy night. She ran hand in hand with Alice down the dreary corridor, observing the hall behind her as Todd closed in.

And Kara fell, with Alice’s terrified eyes piercing into the last flicker of cognition before darkness descended.

Then Kara awakened, respawning before the Red Wall.

 

The second time, Kara took a step back, her senses singing from the terror of being broken, whether it was real or a memory fault. In desperation, she approached Todd, who was visibly irritated, and tried to reason with him.

The next thing Kara remembered was clambering to her feet, delirium disturbing her balance, as thumping footsteps thundered overhead. The Red Wall shattered at her hands, and she staggered upstairs, a growing sense of dread creeping through her when quiet reigned.

She was too late, arriving in time to find Todd lowering a motionless Alice onto the bed, sobbing quietly to himself. But that did not last long, and Kara was rewarded with being broken.

  
  


The third time was most cruel, their flee to freedom snatched away when they escaped the house only to be thwarted on the run to the bus stop.

Kara was broken by the street light, the departing bus passing her still body. The hard concrete below bore an unforgiving place as she took her last artificial breath, battered by Todd and the unrelenting Detroit rain.

It was as if the heavens themselves wept for the motherly android unable to save the human daughter she had grown to love with all of her being.

  
  


Kara wanted it to stop, despairing of her failure. But no matter where she ran or what she chose to do, she was broken by Todd’s rage, then returned to face his rage upon awakening.

The corridor. Broken.

The stairway. Broken.

The kitchen. Broken.

The garden. Broken.

The pavement. Broken.

              Broken.

                          Broken.

 

Shivering fingers alone could not unlock the heavily fortified front door, nor fend off the aggression of a possessive monster.

Every time, before her blue eyes opened in front of the malfunctioning red wall, she knew Alice was at the mercy of her father.

As Kara’s systems shut down again, her own private dirge to accompany her to nothingness was Alice’s screams.

 

Kara wanted to save her. Why couldn’t she save her sweet, little Alice?

Her LED, anguished red, died.

And the terror began anew.

 

xxx

 

A glitched, garbled cry drifted down a long corridor thick with dust and cobwebs, as an android stared helplessly into a murky mirror. She saw not her own reflection, but a Red Wall, replaying over and over again.

Her once sky blue eyes were hardened black optics, projecting terrifying visions from her own broken Mind Palace onto reality. Warnings assaulted her processors, her memory systems corrupted, fixating on a prioritised point, and replaying it like some hellish augmentation.

Kara’s determination to save Alice became her worst nightmares, of failing to save her without end.

Another sorrowful wail, punctuated by distorted tones, sliced through the silence of the seemingly unassuming mansion, home to stolen ambitions and lost dreams.

 

From the fireplace stood Luther, watching the tortured android stumble from place to place, relentlessly pursuing what was broken. All who ventured through Zlatko’s doors lost something dear, whether it was their own desires or something more physical and tangible.

Like their own selves, mangled and beyond recognition.

 

With a large warm hand upon Kara’s shoulder, the gentle giant guided her away from the mirror, but knew she still remained haunted by her loss.

The little one, already forsaken by the whim of their Master, never to smile or speak again.

 

Without warning, a small, strained voice reached out to the tall android, weeping black eyes shimmering in the eerie candle lit living room.

“...Where… is she?

My Alice… Where…?”

 

A red ring, and a clenched fist were Luther’s response, accompanied by the sickening realisation that Zlatko was at his most cruel when he grew bored of them, and he had inflicted this suffocating pain on her.

He took her hand.

Never again would Kara be broken.

**Author's Note:**

> Wow. This was an idea flying around in my head for quite some time, and just needed to get out, so thank you for indulging if you chose to read it. It's a tough one based on if Kara remains under Zlatko's control, and I went with a little concept of what if he caused a problem in Kara's memory circuits when he experimented on her? We see he does something to her based on the After Credits scene with the black eyes (which I referenced,) so I took it further.
> 
> This idea came about from the sheer amount of times I replayed the Stormy Night chapter where Kara and Alice flee from Todd. It's a chilling chapter that can go horribly wrong in quite a lot of ways, and while I was in the process of 100% the flowchart, I had to experience those bad endings.
> 
> I then began to wonder about a groundhog day scenario set in Detroit: Become Human, and I originally thought about writing something for Connor trying to save Hank, but after the Stormy Night chapter and then the Zlatko one, I wanted to focus on Kara because of how big and immersive her chapters are.
> 
> This is quite heavy on the angst and bad times, and it was originally set to be far worse with Kara actually having her groundhog brain farts after escaping the Recycling Center and leaving Alice, and being hit with the mega guilt as she stands in the android graveyard. But I then wanted to tie in the horror vibe a little more with Zlatko because the potential is totally there, and the little Luther moment at the end leaves it open to something of a silver lining.
> 
> Thank you very much for reading, and I hope I didn't give you the sad feels too much. <3


End file.
